1998 Decisions

Opinions of the United

States Court of Appeals

for the Third Circuit

7-20-1998

In Re: Jaritz Industries

Precedential or Non-Precedential:

Docket 97-7225

Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/thirdcircuit_1998

This decision is brought to you for free and open access by the Opinions of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit at Villanova

University School of Law Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in 1998 Decisions by an authorized administrator of Villanova

University School of Law Digital Repository. For more information, please contact Benjamin.Carlson@law.villanova.edu.

Recommended Citation

"In Re: Jaritz Industries" (1998). 1998 Decisions. Paper 162.

http://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/thirdcircuit_1998/162
Filed July 20, 1998 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT 

NOS. 97-7225 and 97-7226 

IN RE: JARITZ INDUSTRIES, LTD. 

VICKERS ASSOCIATES, LTD. 

v. 

JOEL URICE 

M.A.F.F., INC. (Intervenor in D.C.) 

(D.C. Civil No. 96-3) 

IN RE: JARITZ INDUSTRIES, LTD. 

d/b/a PENNYSAVER PRINTING, Debtor 

M.A.F.F., INC. (Intervenor in D.C.) 

(D.C. Civil No. 96-28) 

 M.A.F.F., Inc. (Intervenor in D.C.) 

 Appellant in No. 97-7225 

 Estate of Jaritz Industries, Ltd. 

 d/b/a Pennysaver Printing, through 

 its Chapter 7 Trustee, John Ellis, 

 Appellant in No. 97-7226 

On Appeal From the District Court 

For the Virgin Islands 

(D.C. Civil Action No. 96-cv-00003) 

Argued December 9, 1997 

BEFORE: SLOVITER, Chief Judge, STAPLETON and 

MANSMANN, Circuit Judges 

(Opinion Filed July 20, 1998) 
 Carol A. Rich (Argued) 

 Campbell, Arellano & Rich 

 No. 4 A&B Kongens Gade 

 P.O. Box 11899 

 Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas 

 USVI 00801 

 Attorney for Appellant 

 Jaritz Industries, Ltd. 

 Richard R. Knoepfel 

 Dudley, Clark & Chan 

 Suite 1 

 9720 Estate Thomas 

 Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas 

 USVI 00802 

 Attorney for Appellant 

 M.A.A.F., Inc. 

 A. Jeffrey Weiss (Argued) 

 A.J. Weiss & Associates 

 4002 Raphune Hill Road, Suite 3 

 Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas 

 USVI 00802 

 Attorney for Appellee 

 Vickers Associates, Ltd. 

OPINION OF THE COURT 

STAPLETON, Circuit Judge: 

We are here asked to review a decision of the District 

Court of the Virgin Islands in an appeal from an order of a 

bankruptcy judge sitting in the Virgin Islands by 

designation of the Third Circuit Judicial Council under 28 

U.S.C. S 155. The district court held that section 155 does 

not authorize the Council to transfer bankruptcy judges 

temporarily to the Virgin Islands. It concluded that the 

order appealed from was thus entered without authority 

and was invalid. We will reverse and remand for further 

proceedings. 

 2 
I. 

Section 155 of Title 28 of the United States Code 

provides, in relevant part: 

 (a) A bankruptcy judge may be transferred to serve 

 temporarily as a bankruptcy judge in any judicial 

 district other than the judicial district for which such 

 bankruptcy judge was appointed upon the approval of 

 the judicial council of each of the circuits involved. 

 (b) A bankruptcy judge who has retired may, upon 

 consent, be recalled to serve as a bankruptcy judge in 

 any judicial district by the judicial council of the circuit 

 within which such district is located. 

The Honorable Joseph L. Cosetti is a retired bankruptcy 

judge of the United States District Court for the Western 

District of Pennsylvania. On August 13, 1996, an order was 

entered by the Judicial Council of the Third Circuit 

memorializing its determination that there was an unmet 

need for the services of a bankruptcy judge in the Virgin 

Islands and recalling Judge Cosetti, pursuant to S 155(b), to 

meet that need.1 

_________________________________________________________________ 

1. There are two authorized district judge seats in the District of the 

Virgin Islands. 48 U.S.C. S 1614. A retirement in October of 1988 

resulted in the district's having only one resident judge for the ensuing 

14 months. Diane Russell, Some Ethical Considerations of Judicial 

Vacancies: A Case Study of the Federal Court System in the United States 

Virgin Islands, 5 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 697, 697-98 (1992) (reprinted in 

138 Cong. Rec. H8313). The death of the remaining judge in December 

of 1989 was followed by a period of two and one-half years during which 

there was no resident judge in the district. Id. The two incumbent 

district judges were sworn in on June 30, 1992, and May 9, 1994, 

respectively. See 981 F. Supp. at XII. During the two years between their 

investitures, the district was served by only one resident judge. Thus, 

the district was severely understaffed for a period of over five and a 

half 

years. In these circumstances, the development of a backlog was 

inevitable; intolerable delays were threatened. 

The Judicial Council of the Third Circuit dealt with this crisis by 

transferring judges from other districts to help service the Virgin 

Islands 

workload. District judges from elsewhere in the Third Circuit and beyond 

were transferred under 28 U.S.C. S 292. In addition, beginning on April 

1, 1990, a New Jersey bankruptcy judge was transferred pursuant to 28 

 3 
Jaritz Industries, Ltd. ("Jaritz"), a printing and copying 

business, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the District 

Court of the Virgin Islands. The case was referred to Judge 

Cosetti pursuant to the district court's standing order of 

reference. Joel Urice, the owner of Jaritz, had purchased 

the business from Vickers Associates, Ltd. ("Vickers") in 

return for an 8-year note that called for two large balloon 

payments at the end of the term. Jaritz sought bankruptcy 

protection primarily due to its inability to make the first of 

these balloon payments to Vickers. 

Several months after the bankruptcy proceedings began, 

A. Jeffrey Weiss entered an appearance as counsel for 

Vickers. Over the next few months, Weiss filed numerous 

frivolous and duplicitous motions and appeals, and his 

unprofessional conduct ultimately resulted in the entry of a 

sanction order by Judge Cosetti. On appeal, the district 

court sustained Judge Cosetti's order sanctioning Weiss 

and Vickers, and then directed Weiss and Vickers to show 

cause why the district court should not invoke its inherent 

power to impose additional sanctions for their conduct 

during the appeal. 

Prior to the return date of the order to show cause, the 

district court sua sponte raised and requested briefing on 

_________________________________________________________________ 

U.S.C. S 155(a). Judge Cosetti relieved him in January of 1992. Following 

Judge Cosetti's retirement in 1994, he was recalled under 28 U.S.C. 

S 155(b) for duty in the Virgin Islands, the District of New Jersey, the 

Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and the Western District of 

Pennsylvania. His authority to sit in the Virgin Islands was continued 

through two subsequent recalls. 

This transfer program has been successful. On December 31, 1989, 

there were 1400 civil cases, 395 criminal cases, and 209 bankruptcy 

cases pending in the District Court of the Virgin Islands. Administrative 

Office of the United States, Federal Judicial Workload Statistics 26, 36, 

58 (Dec. 31, 1990). By March 31, 1996, several months before the order 

issued in this case, there were 873 civil cases, 164 criminal cases, and 

137 bankruptcy cases pending in the district. Administrative Office of 

the United States, Federal Judicial Caseload Statistics 31, 52, 100 (Mar. 

31, 1996). While the backlog had been substantially reduced, the two 

district judges still had a substantial need for assistance with the 

bankruptcy workload. 

 4 
the issue of its jurisdiction to hear appeals from orders of 

a U.S. bankruptcy judge under 28 U.S.C. S 158(a). The 

court ultimately concluded that it had "jurisdiction to 

review the order of a bankruptcy judge who would be

properly authorized by statute to act as a judicial officer of 

the District Court of the Virgin Islands." In re Jaritz Indus., 

207 B.R. 451, 453 (D.V.I. 1997). The court held, however, 

that section 155 authorizes temporary transferring of 

bankruptcy judges only to Article III district courts, that 

Judge Cosetti accordingly lacked authority to sit on the 

District Court of the Virgin Islands, an Article I court, and 

that "there simply [was] no such valid order to review in 

this case." Id. The district court viewed Judge Cosetti's lack 

of authority as depriving it of subject matter jurisdiction 

and dismissed the appeal. Shortly thereafter, the court 

entered an order withdrawing its standing order of 

reference. Jaritz timely appealed, and we have jurisdiction 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. SS 1291 and 1294(3). The issue in 

this appeal is a question of law over which this court 

exercises plenary review. Epstein Family Partnership v. 

Kmart Corp., 13 F.3d 762, 765-66 (3d Cir. 1994). 

II. 

Bankruptcy Judge Cosetti imposed sanctions on Vickers 

and Weiss pursuant to Fed. R. Bankr. P. 9011, which

provides for sanctions parallel to those specified in Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 11. In Willy v. Coastal Corp., 503 U.S. 131 (1992), 

the Supreme Court held that a district court has 

jurisdiction to impose Rule 11 sanctions on litigants and 

attorneys appearing before it even if the court is 

subsequently determined to lack subject matter jurisdiction 

over the case in which the sanctionable conduct occurred. 

While acknowledging that "[a] final determination of lack of 

subject-matter jurisdiction of a case in a federal court, of 

course, precludes further adjudication of it," the Court 

nonetheless clarified that "such a determination does not 

automatically wipe out all proceedings had in the district 

court at a time when the district court operated under the 

misapprehension that it had jurisdiction." Id. at 137. 

The Court explained that "maintenance of orderly 

procedure" provided sufficient grounds to justify an 

 5 
imposition of non-case dispositive sanctions "even in the 

wake of a jurisdiction ruling later found to be mistaken." Id. 

Although parties may eventually seek appellate review of a 

court's invocation of jurisdiction over their dispute, they are 

required to demean themselves appropriately before that 

court while awaiting that appeal: 

 The interest in having rules of procedure obeyed. . . 

 does not disappear upon a subsequent determination 

 that the court was without subject-matter jurisdiction. 

 Courts do make mistakes . . . . But . . . there is no 

 constitutional infirmity under Article III in requiring 

 those practicing before the courts to conduct 

 themselves in compliance with the applicable

 procedural rules in the interim, and to allow the courts 

 to impose Rule 11 sanctions in the event of their 

 failure to do so. 

Id. at 139. 

We recognize that the validity of Judge Cosetti's sanction 

orders poses a somewhat different issue than that posed in 

Willy. The authority of the sanctioning judge to sit in his 

district was not challenged in Willy. Nevertheless, we 

believe that the principles found controlling in Willy must 

control here. Judge Cosetti was a duly appointed judge with 

the authority to exercise the judicial power of the United 

States in bankruptcy matters. He was sitting in the District 

of the Virgin Islands, rather than his home district, 

pursuant to a duly adopted resolution of the Judicial 

Council of the Third Circuit. He exercised judicial power 

over this particular controversy by virtue of a standing 

order of the district court and without protest from Vickers 

or Weiss. Both he and the litigants had a substantial 

interest in the proceedings being conducted in an orderly 

manner. Just as in Willy, Judge Cosetti's and the litigants' 

interests in having rules of procedure obeyed did not 

disappear upon the subsequent determination of the 

district court that Judge Cosetti lacked jurisdiction. By the 

same token, Vickers and Weiss were and are obligated to 

conduct themselves appropriately in these proceedings 

unless and until it is finally determined that the apparent 

authority of Judge Cosetti is invalid. 

 6 
It follows that the district court was in error when it 

concluded that Judge Cosetti's sanction order was invalid 

because it was issued without jurisdiction. It also follows, 

in our view, that the district court had appellate 

jurisdiction to review that order and that any sanctions 

which the district judge might have imposed as a result of 

improper conduct during the appellate proceedings would 

have to be sustained by us without reference to our

determination regarding the validity of the Circuit Council's 

transfer order. See In re Orthopedic "Bone Screw" Prod. 

Liab. Litig., 132 F.3d 152, 156 (3d Cir. 1997). 

Under normal circumstances, we would conclude our 

analysis here. The foregoing discussion therefore provides 

adequate support for our mandate. Nonetheless, the district 

court's opinion expresses the view that any bankruptcy 

judge transferred to the Virgin Islands by the Circuit 

Council lacks authority to adjudicate any bankruptcy 

matters there, and this view has resulted in the withdrawal 

of the district's standing order of reference. This has 

substantially burdened the administration of bankruptcy in 

the Virgin Islands. Because the issue is of such significance 

and the parties have briefed it extensively, we pursue our 

discussion of whether Judge Cosetti was properly 

authorized to hear bankruptcy matters in the Virgin

Islands. 

III. 

The specific issue for decision here is a narrow one: what 

did Congress intend when it used the term "judicial

district" in section 155. Did it use the term in a generic 

sense to refer to the geographic area in which a district 

court exercises judicial authority in bankruptcy matters, or 

did it intend its scope to be limited to the geographic area 

in which an Article III district court exercises judicial 

authority over such matters. If Congress intended the 

former, section 155 authorizes transfers of bankruptcy 

judges to serve in the district in which the District Court of 

the Virgin Islands exercises bankruptcy jurisdiction. If 

Congress intended the latter, section 155 provides no such 

authority. 

 7 
The Bankruptcy Amendments and Federal Judgeship Act

of 1984 effected a comprehensive reorganization of our 

bankruptcy system in the wake of the Supreme Court's 

decision in Northern Pipeline Construction Co. v. Marathon 

Pipe Line, 458 U.S. 50 (1982), finding the jurisdictional 

provisions of the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978 

unconstitutional. Chapter 6 of Title 28, as amended by the 

1984 Act, specifies the character and operation of the 

reorganized system. The transfers authorized by section 

155 are an integral part of that Chapter and of that 

reorganized system. 

We find nothing in the text of section 155 that limits its 

scope to judicial districts having an Article III district court. 

Similarly, we find nothing in the text of Chapter 6 that, as 

a matter of textual analysis, so limits the scope of that 

section. Finally, we find nothing in the very sparse 

legislative history of the 1984 Act that suggests an intent to 

restrict the authorization conferred by section 155 to Article 

III districts. Thus, consideration of the text and legislative 

history of Chapter 6 alone would tend to support the view 

that "judicial district" was intended to include any district 

in which judicial authority over bankruptcy matters is 

exercised. We would, of course, be remiss however if we 

decided this statutory construction issue without 

considering the purpose of section 155 and its place in the 

scheme of Chapter 6. Accordingly, we inquire whether the 

broader or the narrower reading of "judicial district" will 

best serve Congress's objectives in enacting Chapter 6 and 

section 155 in particular. 

The overall objective of Chapter 6 was to create a 

reorganized bankruptcy system in which a specialized corps 

of full-time bankruptcy judges would assist district court 

judges in adjudicating bankruptcy matters in a manner 

consistent with the teachings of Marathon. It is evident 

from the face of section 155 that its objective was the 

efficient and effective use of that corps of full-time 

bankruptcy judges. Congress was aware from past 

experience that the demand for bankruptcy services in any 

given district would ebb and flow in response to the 

economic conditions in the district, and that the supply of 

judge power in each district to provide such services would 

 8 
ebb and flow depending on such things as the number of 

district judge and bankruptcy judge vacancies. Moreover, 

Congress determined not to provide the new system with 

part-time bankruptcy judges, and it must have been aware 

that there would be periods when the bankruptcy workload 

in a district would be substantial enough to be difficult to 

service, but nevertheless not yet large enough to warrant 

the appointment of a full-time bankruptcy judge. In this 

context, the new system would be efficient and effective 

only if someone were given the authority to match demand 

with judge power by transferring bankruptcy judges to 

districts where the regularly assigned judicial officers were 

overloaded. This matching authority was appropriately 

conferred on the judicial councils of the circuits, which had 

earlier been directed to "make all necessary and 

appropriate orders for the effective and expeditious 

administration of justice within [their circuits]." 28 U.S.C. 

S 332(d)(1). 

Having identified the evident purpose of section 155, we 

turn to the overall statutory scheme of Chapter 6 to 

determine if there is any reason Congress might have 

wished to garner the efficiencies provided by that section 

for judicial districts having an Article III district court and 

not for judicial districts having an Article I district court 

which exercises the jurisdiction of an Article III court by 

virtue of the legislation that created it. We perceive no such 

reason. To the contrary, our review of the statutory scheme 

has convinced us that Congress intended the new 

bankruptcy system to operate in the Virgin Islands in the 

same manner it was to operate in an Article III district 

under comparable circumstances. 

Under the new system, the district courts retained their 

original subject matter jurisdiction in bankruptcy cases. 

This included both district courts created by Congress 

under Article III of the Constitution as well as territorial 

courts created by Congress under Article I which, like the 

District Court of the Virgin Islands, were authorized to 

exercise the subject matter jurisdiction of Article III district 

courts. Thus, the judges of the District Court of the Virgin 

Islands, like all United States district judges, are authorized 

to adjudicate bankruptcy cases. 

 9 
As we have noted, the 1984 Act created a corps of fulltime bankruptcy judges to assist district judges with the 

bankruptcy workload. These judges were to be appointed in 

the manner set forth in 28 U.S.C. S 152. Subsections 

152(a)(1) and (2) reflect a determination by Congress that 

the then current bankruptcy workload of each Article III 

district court justified one or more full-time bankruptcy 

judges. They establish the number of bankruptcy judge 

seats for each such district and direct that the judgeships 

thus authorized be filled by the United States Court of 

Appeals for the appropriate circuit. Subsection 152(a)(4), on 

the other hand, reflects a determination by Congress that 

the bankruptcy workload of the territorial district courts 

did not yet warrant a full-time bankruptcy judge in any 

such district. 

Most importantly for present purposes, however, 

subsection 152(a)(4) also reflects an anticipation on the 

part of Congress that this situation would change and that 

full-time bankruptcy judges would be needed in one or 

more of the Article I courts in the future. Subsection 

152(a)(4) directs that the district judges of the territorial 

courts will handle the bankruptcy work for the present but 

goes on to authorize the United States Court of Appeals for 

the circuit within which a territorial district court is located 

to fill full-time bankruptcy seats for the judicial district as 

they are created by Congress. Finally, subsection 152(b)(2) 

directs that the Judicial Conference monitor the need for 

full-time bankruptcy judges and periodically submit to 

Congress its recommendations "regarding the number of 

bankruptcy judges needed and the districts in which such 

judges are needed." In this way, Congress would be in a 

position, when the need arose, to increase the number of 

full-time bankruptcy judge seats in Article III districts as 

well as to create new full-time bankruptcy seats in the 

Article I districts. 

Section 157 of the Act, which spells out the jurisdiction 

of bankruptcy judges and their relationships to the judges 

of the district courts, is not limited by its text to the Article 

III courts listed in subsection 152(a)(2). Rather, that text is 

drafted in such a way that once bankruptcy judges are 

available to assist the judges of a district court of a 

 10 
territory, the system will work in the same fashion in that 

district as in other districts with initially authorized 

bankruptcy judge seats. Section 157(a), for example, 

stipulates that "[e]ach district court may provide that any 

or all cases [, arising under, arising in, or related to a case 

under] title 11 shall be referred to the bankruptcy judges 

for the district." It was this provision under which the 

district court of the Virgin Islands entered its general order 

of reference. We believe that order was fully consistent with 

the wording and intent of section 157. 

Finally, note should be taken of section 158, which

governs appeals from final and interlocutory orders of 

bankruptcy judges in proceedings referred to them under 

section 157. With one exception not here relevant, section 

158 provides that "[t]he district courts of the United States 

shall have jurisdiction to hear appeals from final. . . orders 

. . . and with leave of the court, from . . . interlocutory 

orders . . . of bankruptcy judges," and that an appeal to a 

circuit court is permissible only after that jurisdiction has 

been exercised. In In re Kool, Mann, Coffee & Co., 23 F.3d 

66 (3d Cir. 1994), we held that, because the district court 

of the Virgin Islands exercises all of the jurisdiction of a 

district court of the United States under 48 U.S.C.

S 1612(a), section 158(a) applies to orders of a bankruptcy 

judge sitting in its judicial district and forecloses an appeal 

from such an order directly to this court. Implicit in our 

decision in Kool, Mann is the view that Congress 

anticipated that the new bankruptcy system would function 

in the Virgin Islands in the same way it would function in 

other judicial districts having Article III courts in 

comparable circumstances. 

Based on our review of Chapter 6 of Title 28, the 

following relevant propositions seem to us indisputable: (1) 

Congress intended bankruptcy matters to be adjudicated in 

the District Court of the Virgin Islands; (2) Congress 

determined that bankruptcy judges would assist the judges 

of that district when there was a sufficient workload to 

warrant a full-time bankruptcy judge, and the bankruptcy 

system would thereafter function in that district in the 

same manner as in Article III districts; and (3) Congress 

intended the Judicial Council of the Third Circuit to make 

 11 
the most effective and efficient use of district judge and 

bankruptcy judge power in the circuit by temporarily 

transferring bankruptcy judges so as to match the need for 

bankruptcy services in a district with the judge power 

available there. The remaining issue is whether Congress 

intended to foreclose the Judicial Council of the Third 

Circuit from acting to meet an unserved need for 

bankruptcy services in the Virgin Islands by temporary 

transfer prior to the time when the bankruptcy workload is 

of sufficient size and consistency to warrant the creation of 

a full-time bankruptcy judge seat for the District Court of 

the Virgin Islands. Having considered this issue, we now 

make explicit what we believe is implicit in our decision in 

Kool, Mann: We conclude that the 1984 Act evidences no 

Congressional intent arbitrarily to defer the flexibility and 

thus the efficiency provided by section 155 in this manner. 

Accordingly, we respectfully disagree with the district 

court's reading of that section. 

We have thus far confined our discussion to an analysis 

of the text and legislative history of the relevant portions of 

the 1984 Act. As we have indicated, that analysis supports 

the conclusion that "judicial district" in Section 155 

includes the judicial districts of Article I courts. As Weiss 

and Vickers stress, however, the relevant portions of the 

1984 Act have been codified as a part of Title 28 of the 

United States Code, and cognizance of that context should 

be taken when interpreting section 155. Section 451 of Title 

28 contains a set of definitions that apply to terms "[a]s 

used" throughout Title 28. Section 451 provides that the 

term "judicial district" as used in Title 28 refers to "the 

districts enumerated in Chapter 5" of Title 28, the chapter 

that creates Article III district courts. Section 451 can thus 

be cited in support of a conclusion that the authority 

conferred by section 155 is limited to transfers to judicial 

districts having Article III district courts. The definitions of 

section 451 were codified 36 years before the adoption of 

the 1984 Act, however, and are definitions for general 

application throughout all 53 chapters of Title 28. While 

we, of course, recognize that a definitional section like 

section 451 must presumptively be taken as reflecting the 

Congressional intent when a defined term is used even in 

subsequent legislation, it is not controlling where

 12 
consideration of the term's immediate context and its place 

in the overall Congressional scheme clearly indicate that it 

is being used not as a defined term of art but in its 

commonly understood sense. 

We find the situation before us much like that before the 

Supreme Court in International Longshoremen's & 

Warehousemen's Union v. Juneau Spruce Corp., 342 U.S. 

237 (1952). There, the ILWU had sued Juneau Spruce for 

alleged violations of the Labor Management Relations Act in 

the District Court for the Territory of Alaska. Section 303(b) 

of the LMRA authorized suit for violations of its provisions 

"in any district court of the United States." When it 

addressed the issue of the district court's jurisdiction, the 

Supreme Court acknowledged that "[t]he words `district 

court of the United States' commonly describe 

constitutional courts created under Article III of the 

Constitution, not the [Article I] courts of the Territories." Id. 

at 241. Indeed, those words were so defined at the time by 

section 451 of Title 28. The Court went on to suggest that 

there was another less common but permissible reading of 

those words, however, in the context of a district court, like 

the District Court for the Territory of Alaska, that is 

authorized to exercise the jurisdiction of an Article III court. 

The Supreme Court resolved the ambiguity by reference to 

the context in which the words were used and the purpose 

of the congressional scheme. 

The Court noted that the jurisdictional grant in section 

303(b) removed the jurisdictional limitations of amount in 

controversy and citizenship of the parties, defined the 

capacity of labor unions to sue or be sued, restricted the 

enforceability of money judgments against the assets of 

labor unions, specified the jurisdiction of district courts 

over unions, and defined the requirements of service of 

process. The Court reasoned that these provisions reflected 

Congress's design in passing the LMRA to reshape labormanagement relations. Part of this design was to remove 

obstacles to suit in federal courts, and the District Court 

for the Territory of Alaska was the only court in Alaska with 

federal jurisdiction to which the Union could seek recourse. 

Id. at 242. The Court concluded as follows: 

 13 
 [S]ince Congress lifted the restrictive requirements 

 which might preclude suit in courts having the district 

 courts' jurisdiction, we think it is more consonant with 

 the uniform, national policy of the Act to hold that 

 those restrictions were lifted as respects all courts 

 upon which the jurisdiction of a district court has been 

 conferred. That reading of the Act does not, to be sure, 

 take the words `district court of the United States' in 

 their historic, technical sense. But literalness is no 

 sure touchstone of legislative purpose. The purpose 

 here is more closely approximated, we believe, by giving 

 the historic phrase a looser, more liberal meaning in 

 the special context of this legislation. 

Id. at 242-43. 

We believe the teachings of Juneau Spruce counsel a

liberal interpretation of section 155 based on its underlying 

context and purpose. Congress enacted a uniform, national 

policy of bankruptcy administration in the 1984 Act, and 

section 155 of that Act was designed to facilitate efficient 

use of judicial resources. Congress inserted section 155 

into the 1984 Act so that the circuit judicial councils could 

allocate bankruptcy judges among the "judicial districts" in 

which bankruptcy cases are adjudicated. Although the term 

"judicial district" as defined elsewhere in the Judicial Code 

refers only to the specifically enumerated district courts, 

the purpose of section 155 -- ensuring maximally efficient 

use of judicial resources -- is "more closely approximated" 

by a more pragmatic and flexible construction of that term. 

IV. 

Even if we were persuaded that section 451 limits the 

scope of section 155, and that the latter section, 

accordingly, does not reflect an affirmative decision by 

Congress to authorize temporary transfers of bankruptcy 

judges to judicial districts of Article I courts, our ultimate 

resolution of the issue before us would be the same. 

Section 332(d)(1) of Title 28 of the United States Code 

directs that "[e]ach judicial council shall make all necessary 

and appropriate orders for the effective and expeditious 

administration of justice within its circuit," and section 

 14 
332(d)(2) orders that "[a]ll judicial officers and employees of 

the circuit shall promptly carry into effect all orders of the 

judicial council." The text of this provision and its 

legislative history convince us that it authorizes circuit 

councils to take any administrative action that will promote 

the effective and expeditious administration of justice in 

their circuits, so long as the action is not inconsistent with 

rules and policies Congress has previously established in 

statutes regulating the affairs of the federal judiciary. 

The temporary transfer of a duly appointed bankruptcy 

judge to a judicial district of an Article I court to service the 

bankruptcy workload in that district is clearly an 

administrative action designed to promote the effective and 

expeditious administration of justice in the circuit. Given 

our previously stated conclusions that Congress (1) has 

determined in 48 U.S.C. S 1612(a) that bankruptcy cases 

will be adjudicated in the Virgin Islands, (2) has approved 

in section 152(a)(4) the use of bankruptcy judges to assist 

the district judges of the Virgin Islands in servicing the 

bankruptcy load, and (3) has endorsed in section 155(a) a 

policy favoring temporary transfer of bankruptcy judges to 

match the demand for bankruptcy services with available 

judge power, we conclude that Judge Cosetti's transfer to 

the Virgin Islands by the Third Circuit Judicial Council was 

authorized by 28 U.S.C. S 332(d). 

It is apparent from the text of section 332(d) and from its 

legislative history that it was intended to charge circuit 

councils with the responsibility of assuring the prompt and 

efficient administration of justice in their circuits. This 

charge included an express mandate that they were to 

initiate any and all actions necessary to provide that 

assurance. The authority conferred was neither restricted 

nor discretionary. That authority was clearly broad enough 

to encompass the action taken by the Circuit Council here. 

The Honorable Emanuel Celler was a member of the 

House Committee on the Judiciary when section 332(d) was 

debated and enacted in 1939. Two decades later, as 

Chairman of that Committee, he had occasion to canvass 

and comment upon the relevant legislative history of that 

provision and the ensuing experience of his Committee. 

Judicial Conference of the United States Report on the 

 15 
Powers and Responsibilities of the Judicial Councils, H.R. 

Doc. No. 87-201, at v-vi (1961). Chairman Celler 

characterized S 332(d) as conferring on the circuit councils 

"all-inclusive responsibility for court management and 

judicial administration." Id. at v. He went on to make the 

following observations concerning the legislative intent: 

 . . . [I]t was the intention of the Congress to charge the 

 judicial councils of the circuits with the responsibility 

 for doing all and whatever was necessary of an 

 administrative character to maintain efficiency and 

 public confidence in the administration of justice. . . . 

 The language of title 28, United States Code, section 

 332 was recommended to the Congress in 1939 by the 

 judges themselves and was deliberately worded in 

 broad terms in order to confer broad responsibility and 

 authority on the judicial councils. It was the 

 considered judgment of the Congress that the judicial 

 councils were by their very nature the proper agents 

 for supervising management and administration of the 

 Federal courts. The councils are close to all the courts 

 of the circuit and know their needs better than anyone 

 else and, by placing responsibility and authority in the 

 councils of the circuits, administrative power in the 

 judicial branch was decentralized, as it ought to be, 

 and in each circuit kept in the hands of judges of the 

 circuit. 

 * * * 

 In past years many problems have been called to the 

 attention of the Committee on the Judiciary which, in 

 my judgment, should have been settled by the judicial 

 council of the circuit and need never have been 

 brought to the attention of the Congress if the judicial 

 council had met the responsibility and exercised the 

 powers conferred upon it by the Congress. I will 

 mention only one example. 

 The Congress is not infrequently importuned to 

 create additional judicial districts and divisions. Most 

 of these demands originate from inadequate judicial 

 service in the localities concerned. Nearly all of them 

 could and should be remedied by action of the judicial 

 16 
 council of the circuit in arranging and planning judicial 

 assignments to provide an equitable distribution of the 

 judgepower of the circuit. 

As these remarks suggest, the primary criticism of the 

courts that had been brought to the attention of Congress 

in 1939 concerned delay in the administration of justice. 

See S. Rep. No. 76-426, at 2-4 (1939). One of the responses 

that Congress expressly expected the new judicial councils 

to adopt was the matching of need for judicial services and 

judge power through inter-district assignment. In his 

concurrence in Chandler v. Judicial Council of the Tenth 

Circuit, 398 U.S. 74 (1970), Justice Harlan undertakes an 

exhaustive analysis of the legislative background of section 

332. Quoting the testimony of Chief Justice Groner, who 

"shouldered most of the task of explaining the purposes of 

the bill to the committees of both Houses of Congress," id. 

at 99, Justice Harlan observes that section 332 was

designed to empower the judicial councils to take a variety 

of ameliorative actions, including "if the statistics showed a 

particular district court to be falling behind in its work, 

[action by] the Council [to] `see to it . . . that assistance is 

given to him whereby the work may be made current.' " Id. 

at 100 (quoting Hearings on S.188 before a Subcomm. of 

the Senate Comm. on the Judiciary, 76th Cong. 11 (1939)). 

Circuit Judge Parker testified similarly before the House 

Judiciary Committee, predicting that the councils could 

explain to districts whose dockets had fallen into arrears 

that they "will send Judge Smith into your district and he 

will assist you in holding court in your district until this 

arrearage is cleared up." Id. at 100 n. 7 (quoting Hearings 

on H.R. 5999 before the House Comm. on the Judiciary, 

76th Cong. 20-21 (1939)) (internal quotation marks omitted).2 

_________________________________________________________________ 

2. The current provision authorizing inter-district transfers of district 

judges, 28 U.S.C. S 292, was not in existence in 1939. Section 17 of Title 

28 of the United States Code of 1927, as it existed in 1939, provided: 

 Whenever any district judge by reason of any disability or 

necessary 

 absence from his district or the accumulation or urgency of 

 business is unable to perform speedily the work of his district, 

the 

 senior circuit judge of that circuit, or, in his absence, the 

circuit 

 justice thereof, may, if in his judgment the public interest 

requires, 

 17 
We believe these portions of the legislative history 

demonstrate that when the Third Circuit Judicial Council 

entered its order temporarily transferring Judge Cosetti to 

the Virgin Islands to assist with the bankruptcy workload 

there, it was doing precisely what Congress intended to 

authorize and require when it adopted S 332(d). In the 

words of Chairman Celler, it was "arranging and planning 

judicial assignments to provide an equitable distribution of 

the judgepower of the circuit." Thus, even were we 

persuaded that section 155 did not affirmatively authorize 

Judge Cosetti's transfer, we would sustain his authority to 

sit in the Virgin Islands under section 322(d). 

V. 

The order of the district court dismissing the appeal 

before it for want of jurisdiction will be reversed, and this 

matter will be remanded to the district court so that it may 

affirm Judge Cosetti's sanction order and determine

whether additional sanctions are appropriate based on 

conduct occurring before it during the appeal. 

_________________________________________________________________ 

designate and assign any district judge of any district court within 

the same judicial circuit to act as district judge in such district and 

to discharge all the judicial duties of a judge thereof for such time 

as the business of the said district court may require. 

Section 332(d) was viewed as supplementing the authority thus 

conferred. 

 18 
SLOVITER, Circuit Judge, joining in Parts I, II, and IV of the 

majority's opinion and concurring in the result. 

Were I a member of Congress, I would willingly vote to 

support a statute with the provisions that my colleagues 

read into section 155 of title 28. But I do not join Part III 

of Judge Stapleton's opinion because we have the obligation 

to construe the text of a statute according to its terms, even 

if we believe that it is likely that Congress made an 

inadvertent omission. This is particularly so when the 

language of the statute literally applied, reaches a coherent, 

albeit undesired, result. Like the district court, I 

"reluctantly" must conclude that the Bankruptcy 

Amendments and Federal Judgeship Act of 1984 does not 

authorize the temporary transfer of bankruptcy judges to 

the district courts of the Virgin Islands. 

The relevant statutory language provides that "[a] 

bankruptcy judge may be transferred to serve temporarily 

as a bankruptcy judge in any judicial district other than the 

judicial district for which such bankruptcy judge was 

appointed. . . ." 28 U.S.C. S 155(a) (emphasis added). Both 

the majority and the district court have correctly framed 

the statutory question as "what did Congress intend when 

it used the term `judicial district' in section 155." Maj. op. 

at 7. And as both the district court and the majority have 

recognized, that term is expressly defined. Section 451 of 

title 28 provides that "[a]s used in this title . . . [t]he term 

`district' and `judicial district' mean the districts enumerated 

in Chapter 5 of this title." 28 U.S.C. S 451 (emphasis added). 

In turn, chapter 5 of title 28 creates 91 enumerated judicial 

districts, including one for the District of Puerto Rico, but 

not for the Virgin Islands. See 28 U.S.C. SS 81-131. 

The Supreme Court has emphasized that 

 in interpreting a statute a court should always turn 

 first to one, cardinal canon before all others. We have 

 stated time and again that courts must presume that 

 a legislature says in a statute what it means and 

 means in a statute what it says there. When the words 

 of a statute are unambiguous, then, this first canon is 

 also the last: "judicial inquiry is complete." 

 19 
Connecticut Nat'l Bank v. Germain, 503 U.S. 249, 253-54 

(1992) (citations omitted) (declining to adopt interpretation 

of section of the Bankruptcy Amendments and Federal

Judgeship Act of 1984 that was inconsistent with preexisting section of title 28). The text at issue before us 

admits of no ambiguity. Accordingly, we must assume that 

Congress meant for the term "judicial district" in section 

155 to refer only to those districts enumerated in chapter 

5 of title 28. Because the Virgin Islands is not one of those 

districts, I am compelled to conclude that section 155 does 

not authorize the temporary transfer of a bankruptcy judge 

to the Virgin Islands. 

The majority does not purport to have discovered an

ambiguity in any of the statutes relevant to its decision. 

Rather, they contend that the definitions contained in 

section 451 are not controlling as they only "presumptively" 

reflect congressional intent. Significantly, the only authority 

that the majority cites in support of its interpretive 

technique is International Longshoremen's & 

Warehousemen's Union v. Juneau Spruce Corp., 342 U.S. 

237 (1952). There, the Court was called upon to determine 

whether the phrase "district court of the United States" as 

used in section 303(b) of the LMRA included the thenterritorial court of Alaska. After noting that the phrase 

"district court of the United States" "commonly describe[s] 

constitutional courts created under Article III of the 

Constitution" as opposed to the territorial courts, the 

Supreme Court reasoned that the context and purpose of 

the LMRA required a broader definition. Id. at 241 

(emphasis added). Significantly, the language at issue there 

was not defined in the LMRA nor was it subject to the 

definitional sections of title 28. Thus, with no explicit 

direction from Congress, the Court declined to apply the 

"historic" definition of the phrase "district court of the 

United States" and, instead, adopted one more in keeping 

with the national policy underlying the LMRA. Id. at 243. 

In contrast, Congress has expressly defined the term 

"judicial district" as it appears in section 155 and elsewhere 

throughout title 28. As such, we are not at liberty, as was 

the Court in Juneau Spruce, to fashion a definition which, 

in this court's view, better serves the legislative purpose. 

 20 
Where Congress has made its intention explicit in the text 

of the statute, we are bound to follow its clear instruction. 

It is pure conjecture for the majority to presume that 

Congress did not realize that by placing section 155 within 

title 28 it would be subject to that title's definitional 

provisions. 

Of course, I agree with the majority that one of the 

purposes underlying the 1984 Act was "to facilitate efficient 

use of judicial resources." Maj. op. at 14. It does not follow 

that Congress intended to enact every provision that would 

enhance judicial efficiency. Admittedly, one of Congress's 

overarching objectives was to facilitate the efficient 

distribution of judicial resources, but the unambiguous 

means by which Congress chose to advance that objective 

was to authorize the temporary transfer of bankruptcy 

judges to the 91 "judicial districts" enumerated in chapter 

5 of title 28. Our belief that other transfers would also 

facilitate efficient use of judicial resources cannot drive our 

analysis. 

I conclude, therefore, that section 155 did not authorize 

the transfer of Judge Cosetti to the Virgin Islands. As such 

I cannot join in Part III of the majority's opinion. 

I do, however, agree with the majority that 28 U.S.C. 

S 332(d)(1) invested the Judicial Council with the authority 

to effect the transfer. Thus, to the extent that I, in my 

capacity as Chief Judge of the Third Circuit, signed the 

orders on behalf of the Judicial Council designating and 

assigning Judge Cosetti to the District of the Virgin Islands 

under the authority of 28 U.S.C. S 155(a), repeating the 

language used by my predecessor in entering similar

orders, I believe I erred in the statutory reference, although 

I believe that the Judicial Council clearly had the authority 

to assign Judge Cosetti under 28 U.S.C. S 332(d)(1), given 

the need for his service. Accordingly, I concur in the 

judgment of the court. 

 21 
MANSMANN, Circuit Judge, concurring. 

While I agree with the general principles expounded by 

the majority and the majority's ultimate resolution of the 

issues presented, I write separately to clarify what for me 

are the essential policy considerations that weigh in favor of 

the result reached. 

I. 

The central issue we are called upon to decide is whether 

the temporary transfer provision of the Bankruptcy 

Amendments and Federal Judgeship Act of 1984 ("BAFJA"), 

confers upon the Third Circuit Judicial Council the

authority to assign a United States bankruptcy judge 

temporarily to the United States District Court for the 

District of the Virgin Islands. Specifically, we must 

determine whether Congress intended the term "judicial 

district" as used in section 155(a) of the BAFJA to include 

territorial districts such as the Virgin Islands.1 

A. 

Our starting point, as with any case construing a statute, 

is the language of the statute itself. Robinson v. Shell Oil 

Co., 117 S. Ct. 843, 846 (1997); International Primate 

Protection League v. Administrators of Tulane Educ. Fund, 

500 U.S. 72, 79 (1991). As always, we interpret the

language of the BAFJA by reference to the language itself, 

the specific context in which the language is used, and the 

broader context of the BAFJA as a whole. Robinson, 117 S. 

Ct. at 846. In addition, we interpret the BAFJA in a manner 

which best effectuates Congressional intent and the

legislative purpose underlying its adoption. International 

_________________________________________________________________ 

1. Section 155(a) of the BAFJA provides as follows:

 A bankruptcy judge many be transferred to serve temporarily as a 

 bankruptcy judge in any judicial district other than the judicial 

 district for which such bankruptcy judge was appointed upon the 

 approval of the judicial council of each of the circuits involved. 

28 U.S.C. S 155 (a)(1994)(emphasis added). 

 22 
Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union v. Juneau Spruce 

Corp., 342 U.S. 237, 241-43 (1952). 

As noted by the majority, the BAFJA was enacted to 

respond to the United States Supreme Court's decision in 

Northern Pipeline Constr. Co. v. Marathon Pipe Line Co., 458 

U.S. 50 (1982), holding that Congress' broad grant of 

jurisdiction to non-Article III bankruptcy judges was 

unconstitutional. In July 1984, Congress passed the BAFJA 

in order to create a nationwide, comprehensive judicial 

bankruptcy system that complied with Northern Pipeline. 

In the interim period between Northern Pipeline and the 

enactment of the BAFJA, the courts enacted emergency 

rules that complied with Northern Pipeline to govern the 

operation of the bankruptcy courts until Congress acted. 

See Jean K. FitzSimon and Andrea J. Winkler, Legislative 

History of the Bankruptcy Amendments & Federal Judgeship 

Act of 1984, Collier on Bankruptcy, App. Vol. E, Pt. 6-87, 6- 

99 (15th ed. 1997). The emergency rules were held to be 

justified in order to avoid inundating the district courts 

with bankruptcy cases when an entire system of 

bankruptcy judges with specialized knowledge and 

expertise was already in place. In re Stewart, 741 F.2d 127, 

132 n.6 (7th Cir. 1984). 

In upholding the constitutionality of one such emergency 

rule, our sister court of appeals for the Second Circuit 

offered the following insight into the purpose and policy 

behind establishing bankruptcy courts: 

 There are also strong policy reasons for allowing 

 bankruptcy judges to enter final judgments in 

 traditional bankruptcy disputes. First, the practice 

 eliminates the need for the district courts to enter 

 every bankruptcy case at the beginning. District courts 

 are thus free to attend to other matters on their 

 crowded calendars, giving all litigants a better 

 opportunity to have their day in court. Second, all 

 cases are not appealed. There should be at least one 

 adjudication made by a judge with expertise in 

 bankruptcy law. 

In re Kaiser, 722 F.2d 1574, 1581 (2d Cir. 1983). The 

BAFJA enacted by Congress in 1984 was based largely

upon the emergency rules adopted by the courts. 

 23 
B. 

Section 152(a) of the BAFJA provides for the appointment 

of numerous bankruptcy judges for the "several judicial 

districts" in the states listed in section 152(a)(2). In 

addition, the BAFJA includes the following provision 

relating to the establishment of bankruptcy judges in 

territories such as the Virgin Islands: 

 The judges of the district courts for the territories shall 

 serve as the bankruptcy judges for such courts. The 

 United States court of appeals for the circuit within 

 which such a territorial district court is located may 

 appoint bankruptcy judges under this chapter for such 

 district if authorized to do so by the Congress of the 

 United States under this section. 

28 U.S.C. S 152 (a)(4)(1994). We have not appointed a 

bankruptcy judge to the Virgin Islands under this provision 

because Congress has yet to authorize such an 

appointment. 

As the initial BAFJA provision establishing a bankruptcy 

system for the territories, section 152(a)(4) is central to our 

analysis of whether Congress intended the term "judicial 

district" to encompass the Virgin Islands. By using the 

phrase "for such district" in this section, Congress 

expressed its intention to include the territories when 

employing the term "district." Because the terms "district" 

and "judicial district" are used interchangeably within the 

BAFJA and because the word "judicial" has no limiting 

connotation in connection with courts in the territories, 

Congress' clear expression that the term "district" includes 

the Virgin Islands extends equally to the term "judicial 

district." See generally 28 U.S.C. S 156 (1994)(discussing 

appointment of law clerks for bankruptcy judges and using 

the term "district" in section 156(f) and"judicial district" in 

section 156(e) interchangeably).2 

This interpretation of the terms "judicial district" and 

"district" is consistent with their use in the BAFJA as a 

_________________________________________________________________ 

2. The fact that Congress has traditionally defined the terms "district" 

and "judicial district" as synonyms further supports this conclusion. See 

28 U.S.C. S 451 (1994). 

 24 
whole. If Congress were to authorize and we were to

appoint a bankruptcy judge to the Virgin Islands as

contemplated by section 152(a)(4), only our interpretation of 

these terms would give the statute the meaning Congress 

intended. For example, section 158 which governs appeals 

from bankruptcy judge decisions provides that appeals 

"shall only be taken to the district court for the judicial 

district in which the bankruptcy judge is serving." This 

section contemplates that a decision by a duly authorized 

and appointed Virgin Islands bankruptcy judge may only be 

appealed to the District Court of the Virgin Islands. See In 

re Kool, Mann, Coffee & Co., 23 F.3d 66, 67-68 (3d Cir. 

1994)(holding that section 158 requires that an appeal from 

a bankruptcy judge sitting by designation in the Virgin 

Islands must be taken to the district court). 

If we were to interpret the term "judicial district" as 

excluding the Virgin Islands, the BAFJA would contain no 

provision to govern direct appeals from a Virgin Islands 

bankruptcy judge. In light of the fact that Congress 

undisputedly contemplated the future appointment of such 

a judge, it is inconceivable that Congress would provide no 

provision to appeal from that judge's decisions. This is 

especially true given that the BAFJA was adopted to

address Northern Pipeline, the Supreme Court decision that 

curtailed Congress' former broad grant of jurisdiction to 

non-Article III bankruptcy judges. Section 158 therefore 

must include appeals from bankruptcy judges in the Virgin 

Islands, and, a fortiori, the term "judicial district" as used 

therein must include the Virgin Islands. See also 28 U.S.C. 

SS 154(a), 156, 157(a)(1994)(setting forth general provisions 

that would have no force in relation to a duly appointed 

Virgin Islands bankruptcy judge if the terms "district" and 

"judicial district" were meant to exclude the Virgin Islands). 

As noted by the majority, 28 U.S.C. S 451, may be cited 

as casting doubt upon our determination that the terms 

"judicial district" and "district" include the Virgin Islands. 

Section 451 defines those terms as "the districts 

enumerated in Chapter 5," i.e. districts containing only 

Article III courts. See 28 U.S.C. S 451 (1994). I agree with 

the majority, however, that this section is not controlling in 

light of the fact that it was codified 36 years prior to the 

 25 
BAFJA and because this definition does not comport with 

the logical meaning of the terms as used in the BAFJA. See, 

e.g., Juneau Spruce, 342 U.S. at 241 (rejecting a historical 

definition also found in section 451 where that definition 

did not comport with the logical meaning of the term that 

best effectuated the purpose of the statute). At most, 

section 451 renders these terms facially ambiguous, an 

ambiguity that can be conclusively resolved by examining 

the legislative purpose behind adoption of the BAFJA. 

C. 

As the majority recognizes, the approach taken by the 

Court in International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's 

Union v. Juneau Spruce Corp., 342 U.S. 237 (1952), is 

particularly instructive to our analysis of the proper 

interpretation of the BAFJA in light of the legislative 

purpose underlying its adoption. In Juneau Spruce, the 

Court was faced with determining whether the District 

Court of the Territory of Alaska was a `district court of the 

United States' for purposes of conferring upon it 

jurisdiction for actions brought under the Labor 

Management Relations Act ("LMRA"). Juneau Spruce, 342 

U.S. at 240. While the Court recognized that the words 

`district court of the United States' are commonly used to 

describe Article III courts, the Court nevertheless held that 

in the context of the LMRA, that term was used to describe 

courts which exercise the jurisdiction of district courts. Id. 

at 241. 

In so holding, the Court relied on the legislative purpose 

of the LMRA. The Court found that Congress enacted the 

LMRA to eliminate obstacles to suits in federal courts. 

Furthermore, the Court relied on the fact that the LMRA 

"extends its full sweep to Alaska as well as to the states 

and the other territories. The trial court is indeed the only 

court in Alaska to which recourse could be had." Id. at 242. 

Recognizing that applying the LMRA to the District Court of 

Alaska does not give the words "district court of the United 

States" their literal and historic meaning, the Court 

nonetheless embraced this reading as effectuating the 

uniform, national policy and purpose of the LMRA. 

 26 
As previously noted, the BAFJA was sweeping legislation 

enacted to establish a national bankruptcy system that 

includes the Virgin Islands. The BAFJA includes provisions 

relating to the territories and specifically provides for the 

appointment of bankruptcy judges to the territories if 

authorized by Congress. As sweeping legislation designed to 

establish a national bankruptcy system, the BAFJA is at 

least as broad as the LMRA at issue in Juneau Spruce. In 

addition, as with the LMRA, if general terms within the 

BAFJA such as "district court" and "judicial district" do not 

include the District Court of the Virgin Islands, there are 

circumstances under which no court within the Virgin 

Islands would be able to effectuate its general provisions.3 

Furthermore, the purpose of establishing a nationwide 

bankruptcy system is to alleviate the district courts of 

excessive workloads and to provide a system where judges 

with experience and expertise in bankruptcy matters can 

handle bankruptcy claims. In re Kaiser, 722 F.2d 1574, 

1581 (2d Cir. 1983). In fact, in addition to revising the 

bankruptcy system, the BAFJA also created 85 new federal 

judgeships in order to "help alleviate the tremendous 

litigation backlogs in our courts." Collier on Bankruptcy, 

App. Vol. E, Pt. 6-146 (15th ed. 1997)(Statements from 

floor, 130 Cong. R. H. 7497). 

The temporary transfer provision in the BAFJA is 

analogous to the temporary transfer of district judges found 

at 28 U.S.C. S 291 (1994). Transfer provisions such as 

_________________________________________________________________ 

3. The following example illustrates this point. Section 157 provides that 

"[e]ach district court may provide that any or all cases under title 11 . 

. . 

shall be referred to the bankruptcy judges for the district." 28 U.S.C. 

S 157(a)(1994). Suppose that a bankruptcy judge was appointed to the 

Virgin Islands under section 152(a)(4) after authorization by Congress. If 

general terms in the BAFJA such as "district court" or "judicial district" 

were read to exclude the District Court of the Virgin Islands, 

technically, 

the District Court of the Virgin Islands would never have the authority 

to refer bankruptcy cases pursuant to section 157(a) to a bankruptcy 

judge properly appointed under section 152(a)(4). In construing the 

BAFJA, we must presume that Congress did not intend this absurd 

result. See, e.g., United States v. Schneider, 14 F.3d 876, 880 (3d Cir. 

1994)(stating that "[i]t is the obligation of the court to construe a 

statute 

to avoid absurd results . . . ."). 

 27 
these are to be used to "deal with an administrative 

problem" and are purely "ministerial". See Meeropol v. 

Nizer, 429 U.S. 1337, 1339 (1977)(discussing the nature of 

28 U.S.C. S 291). Generally, such provisions are properly 

used to assist a circuit with a heavy workload. Id.

Given that Congress specifically included the Virgin 

Islands within the scope of the BAFJA, there is no rational 

reason for Congress to have intended to exclude the Virgin 

Islands from the transfer provision in the BAFJA and 

thereby preclude the District Court of the Virgin Islands 

from obtaining aid and specialized expertise in handling 

their bankruptcy caseload. Our construction of the terms 

"judicial district" and "district" as including the Virgin 

Islands therefore best effectuates the purpose and scope of 

the BAFJA generally and the transfer provision specifically. 

Accordingly, because the term "judicial district" must be 

read to include the Virgin Islands, section 155(a) grants the 

Third Circuit Judicial Council the authority to transfer a 

bankruptcy judge temporarily to serve in the Virgin Islands. 

II. 

In light of the foregoing discussion, it is clear that the 

BAFJA affirmatively confers upon the Council the authority 

for a temporary transfer of a bankruptcy judge to the Virgin 

Islands. At a minimum, however, the BAFJA is silent on the 

Council's authority; the BAFJA contains no affirmative 

Congressional statement denying the Council the authority 

to transfer bankruptcy judges to the Virgin Islands. 

Because the BAFJA contains no such affirmative 

restriction, I agree with the majority's conclusion that the 

Council has the inherent authority to make such a transfer 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. S 332(d)(1994). 

III. 

I also agree with the majority's conclusion that regardless 

of the Council's authority to transfer temporarily a 

bankruptcy judge to the Virgin Islands under either the 

BAFJA or 28 U.S.C. S 332(d), Judge Cosetti's sanction 

orders are valid for the reasons the Court articulated in 

Willy v. Coastal Corp., 503 U.S. 131 (1992). In light of our 

 28 
determination that both the BAFJA and 28 U.S.C.S 332(d) 

grant the Council the authority to make temporary transfer 

to the Virgin Islands, however, a specific determination on 

the validity of Judge Cosetti's sanction orders is 

unnecessary to our resolution of this appeal. I write 

separately with regard to this point only to note that while 

I agree with the majority's conclusion on the independent 

validity of Judge Cosetti's sanction orders, I view this issue 

as secondary to our analysis of the Council's authority to 

make a temporary transfer and consider it to be merely a 

supplemental ground for our decision. 

A True Copy: 

Teste: 

 Clerk of the United States Court of Appeals 

 for the Third Circuit 

 29